It’s Time to Start Paying Attention to Etsy

Not just for hobbies and crafts anymore, the shopping site is ready to take over the world of retail.

“When you look at what’s happening on Etsy, it’s not that much different than when you look at the early personal-computing movement,” says Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak building PCs in the garage back in the ’70s. “That was a bunch of people building computers, and it looked like a hobby that would never really matter that much.”

And yet it was a hobby that turned into a multibillion-dollar business and changed the world as we know it. It would be a bit of an overstatement to say that Etsy is poised to similarly alter our everyday lives, but if you still think Etsy is just a group of crafty people selling things on the Internet, think again. The online marketplace is looking to redefine retail with its latest initiative, Etsy Wholesale.

Independent, emerging designers have been using Etsy as a platform to sell and promote their work ever since it launched in 2005. Now more than ever, these designers are having impressive success with this business model thanks to Etsy’s expansive reach.

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Etsy HQ in Brooklyn

Photo Courtesy of Etsy

Just look at the numbers: Last year, the peer-to-peer marketplace with over 40 million members swelled to more than $1.35 billion in sales. By comparison, $525.6 million worth of handcrafted goods were sold through the site in 2012. And since we measure nearly everything in likes and followers these days, consider this: Etsy has a whopping 2.42 million Twitter followers. Net-a-Porter has 676,000 and eBay has 445,000.

But what’s more impressive than big social media numbers? Celebrity fans. Earlier this year the Internet went wild when Beyoncé was spotted wearing Reuben Reuel’s African-inspired pieces. Who is Reuel? Turns out he’s an Etsy designer (his brand name is Demestiks New York).

Etsy Wholesale makes it that much easier for designs from obscure, small-scale clothing and accessory labels to land on big-name stars and in major retailers, with a much lower barrier to entry. So…what is it, exactly? It’s a private, juried marketplace, curated by a team of experts, which launched out of beta in August with about 1,500 designers. Both major retail and independent boutique buyers can use Etsy Wholesale to discover rising designers and buy the pieces at no fee.

Etsy.com homepage

“For designers, having the product in a store is very aspirational,” Etsy senior program manager Rand Niederhoffer tells Style.com. “This is about taking people with a real vision and bringing it to life through a very curated site, and then connecting them to retailers and getting their foot in the door.”

Department stores like Nordstrom and West Elm are bringing Etsy designs onto their racks. “If they missed the boat on winter white, they can go online and order product from our Etsy sellers year-round, because the turnaround is so much shorter than traditional designers showing on the normal fashion week schedule,” says Niederhoffer. “They can react to trends and feedback immediately.”

The draw isn’t just the flexibility that Etsy sellers offer, it’s the backstory and the uniqueness of their products. They’re artisanal, they’re eco (in some cases), they’re handmade, and they’re one-of-kind. (Etsy is based in Brooklyn, after all.) That’s a bunch of key marketing buzzwords that score big points with buyers these days. One thing is for sure: With Etsy, you won’t be the third girl in the front row wearing that Isabel Marant skirt.